A series of stories prepared for the Albany County Museum Coalition, an alliance of institutions that promote Laramie’s historic and cultural resources. This series originally appeared in the Laramie Boomerang.

The only time Laramie came close to supplying Wyoming with a governor was in the summer of 1890. It was a short but significant role for Laramie’s John W. Meldrum, who was acting governor of Wyoming Territory when Wyoming was admitted to the Union.

Albany County historical records are loaded with men who are known for their property acquisitions. Ora Haley, Edward Ivinson, Robert Homer, the King brothers are among them. But there were also women who owned significant parcels of land in early Laramie. Jane Ivinson was one of those women.

When Gus Hollo (1905-1999) moved to Laramie in 1936, it was on the recommendation of his sister, Maureen Hollo Person, so she and her UW Engineering-professor spouse could have a home custom-designed by him.

The man who may have been the first permanent European resident of the Laramie Plains, Phillip Mandel (1835-1917), arrived at a date not well documented, but he could have been here 10 years prior to the 1868 founding of Laramie.

When Nicholas F. Spicer (1836-1907) died while still in office as mayor of Laramie, the obituary writer for the front-page story in the Laramie Boomerang said that he had been a member of a vigilante mob that had hung five men nearly 40 years earlier.